The Corpse Dog
by Iscreamer1
Summary: Victor Frankenstein and his dog Sparky are discovered and rescued by surgeon Victor Van Dort from a degrading life as circus freaks and are given a chance to live their last years with comfort, respect and dignity. Based on David Lynch's The Elephant Man and the true story of Joseph Merrick.
1. Chapter 1

**This is story of "The Corpse Dog", a Tim Burton crossover mainly featuring the characters of Frankenweenie and the Corpse Bride in my own little fanfic based on David Lynch's 1980 black and white horror/love biopic The Elephant Man and the real life story of Joseph Merrick.**

**Summary: In Victorian London, Victor Frankenstein's dog, Sparky is intelligent, kind, quiet and can even talk, but because he was brought back from the dead for all of this, the duo are forced to suffer the humiliation of being sideshow freaks. Only when a namesaking doctor Victor Van Dort rescues them, Sparky and his master begin to regain the life of dignity and respect that everyone deserves.**

**Much of the context and dialogue of this fanfic is taken from the movie tie-in novel by Christine Sparks (albeit condensed to make it more simplified and to save a lot of work), Christopher DeVore's original screenplay and even the movie itself. Note that I did not use Frederick Treeves' memoirs or Ashley Montagu's study in dignity for research or resource material, just a few online resources for certain dates and locations in Merrick's life.**

* * *

_August 4__th __– 5__th__, 1880_

_In the mind's eye of a young boy, he could see the gold framed portrait of himself, his parents and a bull terrier._

_The boy was smiling as he threw the ball in the air – a shadow came over him – above him were faces of various other animals… like a horse and an elephant._

_Dark heavy feat were heaving up as the elephant charged at the dog._

_With a powerful hit, the dog was crushed and the boy screamed in denial._

_A day passed, and thanks to his own schoolteacher's experiments on how to conduct electricity, he came home and lifted his dog's body high in the air where it was struck by lightning, he checked for heart signs but nothing happened._

"_I'm sorry, boy."_

_But two more words came out of his mouth he noted the dog's tail moving and pretty soon the whole body came out of the blanket._

"_You're alive!"_

* * *

_Four years later_

_November 3__rd__ 1884_

"A wicked birth…monstrous…evil…"

The elderly man had come out of the shadows so suddenly that Victor Van Dort had not been aware of him until he heard the shaking voice. He turned abruptly, trying to see the man by the poor light of the smoking oil lamps. He could just make out a ravaged face, the lips trembling, the eyes glazed with horror.

"I beg your pardon?" said Van Dort politely. "Did you speak to me?"

"Wicked," the stranger whispered again. "For God's sake leave this place." He was sweating, and even in this gloom Van Dort's professional eye told him that the man was on the verge of vomiting.

Van Dort looked back toward the little stage that had previously held his attention. In a large bell hung a "baby" that closer inspection revealed to be a china doll, with a large snake growing out of it's neck. Labeled "The Deadly Fruit of Original Sin" it was the clumsiest of fakes, and Van Dort could see nothing in it to have so disturbed his companion.

"I assure you, it's nothing but a fake," he informed the elderly man kindly. "If you look closer you can see…"

"That," the man interrupted him scornfully. "I can see through _that! _But down there…" From somewhere in the long canvas corridor behind him a commotion was growing.

"Get out of here," he said. "For pity's sake get out. Don't go near that evil thing."

Abruptly he burst into tears and pushed past Van Dort into another corridor that led to the exit. Without waiting any longer Van Dort plunged ahead in the direction from which the man had appeared. An excitement had taken possession of him.

That summer of 1884 was a good one for fun-fairs and freak shows. Show after show had settled on 123 Whitechapel Road's penny-gaff shop, it was now November and Van Dort had allowed his two young children to nag him into taking them to every one. His wife Victoria knew too well that her children's pleasure was not his main motive.

The freak tent today had been like so many others he entered that year, a mass of black canvas corridors, poorly lit by oil lamps, occasionally opening into wider areas where exhibits lined the walls. The lighting on these exhibits was also kept low, the better to disguise their obvious trickery. Van Dort had seen it all before, and he was bored to tears with fakes.

As Van Dort pushed ahead he could hear a growing noise behind him, and without warning he was shoved aside by two policemen who swept down the corridor with a purposeful air. Up ahead they apparently encountered some difficulty, for they were shouting "Make way, Make way!"-an injunction to which nobody seemed to be paying heed.

Van Dort almost collided with a man coming back down the corridor holding a small boy in his arms. The child was clutching his father's neck in terror, while the man muttered to no one in particular.

"This is too much. They should not allow it-they should not allow it."

Van Dort's excitement quickened. He felt like a hound that has scented the prey, and he realized that he had somehow become the leader of a little crowd all bent on the same ghoulish errand.

At the far end the passage widened to accommodate a stage that was sideways, so that he could not see what it contained. An alderman was arguing with an individual who had white hair and looked chubby and smartly dressed. The horror lay onstage, but as Van Dort moved sideways to see if he could get a good view, he found his way blocked by the policemen.

"No, that's right out. Sorry sir, no more viewing," the policeman turned and yelled over his shoulder. "Drop that curtain."

As the curtain fell Van Dort's darting eyes managed to catch a glimpse of thin trousers belonging to a 14 year old, carrying what might have looked like a dog with mismatched pieces of fur. Whatever was behind the curtain was genuinely monstrous.

"You can't do that!" the owner was protesting. "I've got my rights!"

"I have the authority to close you down," the alderman said firmly, "and I'm just doing that. This exhibit degrades all who see it as well as the poor creature and his master."

"The dog's a freak brought back from the dead!" the other bellowed. "How else is he to live?"

"Freaks are one thing, but no one objects to resurrected dogs on an entirely different matter. This is monstrous and ought not to be allowed. These officers will see to it that you are on your way as soon as possible. Good day!"

He turned sharply and left the tent, leaving the other man to shake his head in disgust and mutter, "Moving again. My treasures."

Van Dort had reached the canvas by now. His hand stretched out. Another moment and he would lift the edge of that curtain and see…

"Have a care my friend."

Van Dort jumped as a thin, small tongue came down on his face and he found himself look directly into the beady eyes of the exhibitor.

"Forgive me…," he murmured, and moved away.

He wasted no more time where obviously nothing further could be learned today. Moving ahead of him toward the exit, he could see the hunch-backed urchin who had been staring at the painted canvas. Van Dort quickened his step, anxious not to lose him in the crowd, and caught up with the boy at the exit. A short conversation ensued, businesslike on both sides. A shilling changed hands. By the time Van Dort went off to find his wife and children, he was sure he and the boy understood each other perfectly.

As soon as he emerged into the cool dusk air, he could see his wife, with their son and daughter, just coming out of another tent. Kevin, his youngest child, was talking a mile a minute. Van Dort gave an unconscious smile. It was always Kevin who was talking.

He fixed his eyes on his wife. At this distance she looked barely more than the girl of twenty he had married eighteen years before. The beauty that had taken his breath away then was settling now into domestic plumpness, but she was still an extraordinary pretty woman.

She did not see him now, but it was Kim, at seventeen years old the elder, who saw her father first and ran forward excitedly, calling him. He wished he'd had time to get away from the freak tent before his wife noticed him, but it was too late now.

Van Dort looked down at his children's chocolate covered faces and smiled. Victoria, after one glance at the tent, became absorbed in cleaning the chocolate from Kim's mouth. Ten-year-old Kevin bounced excitedly.

"Father, may we go in there?" He swept an arm toward the tent, and Victoria's attention swerved sharply to her.

"All right, your turn," she said, adroitly swiveling Kevin so that he could no longer see the tent with it's lurid signs. Kim had not spoken since they had caught up with him. She was not a chatterbox, but a teen who seldom opened her mouth unless she had something to say. Now she stood doggedly by her father's side and pointed to the freak tent.

"I want to go in there with Father," she said.

"Well you can't," retorted Victoria in a sharper voice than Van Dort had ever heard her use before.

Van Dort shook his head at Kim. She was his pet, to whom normally he could refuse nothing. Bur he would refuse her this.

"No, you can't," he agreed. "I've already been in there once. You'd be frightened, the people in there are horribly ugly and I suppose they like it that way."

"What about you, Father? Do you like being frightened?"

"They don't frighten me," he replied, seeing too late where she was leading him.

"Then why do you go see them?"

Before he could think of an answer, Victoria intervened to put an end to what struck her as a totally improper conversation and flung him a look of reproach.

"It's getting late," she said. "I think we'd all better be going home, unless-" She looked at her husband doubtfully. "-Unless you have something else to do here?"

"No." He fell into a step beside her. "Let's go home now. I've seen all I want to."

"Did you find whatever it is you're looking for?"

He was silent so long that she looked at him. He was walking with his head down, studying the ground intently.

"I don't know," he said at last. "But I shall-soon."


	2. Chapter 2

The London Hospital stood at the eastern end of Whitechapel Road, bordering on the slums and light industrial factories from which it drew many of its patients. It was a massive, ugly, and relatively modern building, governed by a committee that was justifiably proud of the hospital's up-to-date equipment and high quality of medicine.

As a surgeon at the London, Van Dort was more exposed than most to the ravages of industry. It fell to him to operate on the huge sweaty men who were brought in with their bodies gashed open by heedless machines. He hated this part of the business.

When an operation was in progress the theater closely resembled the fires of hell. A furnace roared within the cast-iron stove, kept at fever pitch by a pair of bellows constantly pumping air into the open grate beneath it. From the mouth of the stove protruded the handles of several cauterizing irons, their heads embedded in the coals.

The theater was well-furnished with a large sink and a cupboard stocked with dressings and other things a surgeon might need. Van Dort did not expect to have to use manacles in the operation he was preforming today with the assistance of two fellow doctors, Mr. Alfred and Mr. Chambers. Alfred was an able doctor and Van Dort's closest friend among his colleagues. As such he was one of the few of his peers who ventured to criticize him. Van Dort did not take kindly to criticism.

"I say, Victor," he'd said in his languid voice, "don't you think that's a bit- I mean it's enough to kill him-"

"He can't stand it," said Van Dort briskly, as he tied on the black leather apron he wore for operations. "It's coming round that would kill with a wound like that."

Chambers placed a cotton mask over the man's nose and mouth and applied the chloroform. The patient struggled for a moment, but soon his moans of agony subsided and he slipped into unconsciousness.

Van Dort examined the wound, which was fearful. The marks of gear wheels grew progressively deeper as they neared a great open gash in the center of the chest.

"How long has this man been here?" he demanded

"Three-quarters of an hour," Alfred told him.

At the far end of the table, two youngsters stared uneasily at the gaping wound, which bubbled bloodily every time the patient took a breath. Together Van Dort and Alfred were doing an expert job of repairing the ripped chest. Van Dort chatted offhandedly as he worked.

"Abominable things, these machines," he muttered. "One can't reason with them."

"What a mess." Alfred made a face of disgust. There was some part of his stomach that still rose up in outrage at a sight like this and had to be fought down. He felt ashamed of his weakness.

Van Dort glanced up and noticed the students' faces, which were ashen.

"Irons please," he said curtly. There was nothing like forcing a queasy student to take a practical part in an operation to make him forget his own feelings.

The steam from the cauterizing dispersed, leaving Van Dort's face sweaty and satisfied. The word was good. He could see this even now. He stood back and threw down the iron, just as the theater door opened to admit the hunch backed boy of ten.

"Excuse me, Mr. Van Dort, sir."

"Yes?" Van Dort looked up, a sudden tension in his manner that caught Alfred's eye.

"I'll show it to you."

The head vanished behind the door.

"I say, Victor," said Alfred in a low voice. "What was that about?"

"Oh nothing-nothing of any importance." Van Dort had begun to roll down his sleeves and remove his apron. "Nothing of any great importance. All right, you can take this man away."

He departed quickly before he could be asked any more questions. He found the boy waiting for him in the passage.

"Where?' he said briefly.

"Just across the street at the penny-gaff shop."

"I've been there. Are you sure that's where it is?"

"Oh, yes! I have been camping out in the cellar where they pay no rent, and Mr. Barkis Bittern ain't a great man for payin' rent."

"Mr. Bittern would be-?"

"That's _LORD _Barkis to you and he's the owner."

"_Owner?_"

"That's what he calls himself. He brought the boy and dog from the last guardian for a good price. Even the police are moving in and he hasn't made a profit for three days straight."

"Lord Barkis has been talking you into his confidence, has he?"

"What?"

"Lord Barkis has been telling you all this?"

"He tells anyone in the boozer who'll listen. He's known for it."

"How do you know where he lives?"

"I live there too, you know."

Van Dort gave the boy a coin, check his destination again and the two walked out of the hospital.

Two days he had waited since he'd been forced to leave the penny gaff shop empty handed, two days while the hunchbacked kid reported to him about the mysterious monster and his master- only to track him down across the street from the hospital and Van Dort had no doubt that he was on the track of something rare.

The afternoon was cold and wet and the streets got dirtier the farther he went and at last he came to the penny gaff shop without any trouble. Heedless of danger from the authorities, Lord Barkis had grown daring and displayed his poster outside for all the world to see. It announced the monstrous dog could be seen for twopence.

Van Dort made a futile effort to pull the canvas that covered the door aside, but all he could see were windows made opaque with dirt. He became aware of the hunchbacked boy, who was watching him intently.

"Do you know where Lord Barkis is?" he asked, giving him another coin.

The hunchbacked boy, whose name was Edgar E. Gore, went to the of the building where the lder man was while Van Dort studied the poster. At once he recognized the man with white hair that he had seen quarreling with the Alderman in the tent.

"Are you the proprietor?" he demanded.

Lord Barkis stood back and regarded him with suspicion but no recognition. "And who might you be, sir?"

"Just one of the curious," said Van Dort, who had no intention of disclosing his true motives. He had discovered that it had the unfortunate effect of raising the price. "I'd like to see it."

Lord Barkis shook his head with every appearance of sadness. "I don't think so, sir. We're closed."

Van Dort wasted no words. He pulled a purse from his coat, extracted a shilling, and held it out.

"I'd pay handsomely for a private showing. Are you the proprietor?"

Lord Barkis threw caution to the wind and snatched the shilling.

"Never mind. I'm the owner."

From a capacious pocket on the inside of his coat, he produced a key and fumbled at the padlock on the door. It clicked open, and the three of them entered the shop. It was almost totally dark inside because of the huge canvas poster that obscured all the windows. Lord Barkis scrambled around in the dark and managed to light an oil lamp, which cast little light owing to the poor state of the wick and the fact that the glass was thick with dust.

"This way," said Lord Barkis, leading him to a door at the back of the shop.

By keeping the oil lamp in view, Van Dort managed to follow Lord Barkis down a flight of rickety steps to a lower floor that he took to be the cellar. From what he could see, it looked as if it might have been used as a coal hole.

Lord Barkis led the way to the curtain.

"Here we are, sir. My treasures." He began to recite as though sleepwalking. "Ladies and gentlemen ... I would like to introduce Mr. Victor Frankenstein and his dog, Frankenweenie. Before doing so I ask you please to prepare yourselves—Brace yourselves up to witness one who is probably the most remarkable animal ever to draw the breath of life."

With a flourish he rattled back the curtain to reveal a bent figure crouching on a stool, carrying a bundle wrapped in a dirty brown blanket. It seemed to be trying to draw warmth from a large brick that stood on a tripod in front of it, heated below from a Bunsen burner. The head was turned away toward the far wall so that beyond a general impression of massiveness, Van Dort could form no clear idea of it. The only part of the person in question that he could see well was the boy's hair.

The child gave no sign of having heard Lord Barkis' voice or the rattling of the curtain rings, but remained silent and immobile, with the settled look of one who had been so for many weary hours. He stepped closer, unpleasantly aware that Barkis was watching his every move and leering at him in a disgusting conspiratorial manner.

Suddenly Barkis banged his riding whip against the wall and yelled at the crouched boy as if speaking to the dog.

"_Stand up!_"

"_Stand up!_" shrieked Edgar in nervous imitation, dancing about just behind Lord Barkis.

Like his dog, the boy obeyed the tone of command, rising to his feet and letting the bundle fall to the ground as he turned to face Van Dort.

Accustomed as he was to all kinds of dogs, Van Dort could not repress an appalled gasp. Never in his days had he seen anything so monstrous and undead.

Victor Frankenstein was shirtless, wearing only a pair of shabby trousers that had been cut from the dress suit of a very fat man. Even his feet were bare.

Lord Barkis made some effort to trick his exhibits out. Behind them was a poorly constructed backyard with a doghouse. As Van Dort stood there, speechless with horror and disbelief, Barkis rapped the wall again and yelled, "Turn around."

"Turn around, turn around," Edgar echoed in malicious glee.

Slowly, the monster dog crawled out the blanket, revealing its figure. It was a normal looking bull terrier, but had scars on his nose, underbelly and near the tail which appeared to be loose from the re-animating as well as its black ears and nose. It also had stitches and patches from other animals that did not seem to fit the dog's fur color. Around the dog's neck were two nails on each side to where the electricity would surge. The dog and his owner's faces were blank, devoid of expression and incapable of it. But as Van Dort gazed on him, the dog closed his eyes.

The words of the man in the tent came back to Van Dort. "A wicked birth…monstrous." More monstrous than the worst nightmare brain could conceive. Barkis went on with a leer, "Life is full of surprises. Ladies and gentlemen, consider the fate of the poor dog. In fourth month of his household life, he was struck down by a wild elephant. Struck down, if you take my meaning, on the streets of Leicester and brought back from the afterlife, through the power of electricity. The result is plain to see, ladies and gentlemen- _the terrible Frankenweenie._ "

The rings rattled, the curtain fell back into place. Doubtless behind it, Victor Frankenstein and his dog had reseated themselves to wait for the next gawking visitor. Lord Barkis began to lead the way out.

"Down here?" he queried.

"I'm a doctor, Lord Barkis. I work at the London Hospital, where I also lecture in anatomy. A dog like that could be-very interesting to medical science."

"He's not for sale," said Lord Barkis at once.

"I don't want to buy _them _from you. Just-hire?"

They had reached the shop. Barkis held the lamp closer to Van Dort's face. "For how long?"

"It's just few simple hours. I just want to examine him and make some notes. Later I might want them back again."

"At a good price?"

"Of course," said Van Dort in disgust.

They settled on a shilling for every visit, and Barkis agreed to have the boy and his dog ready when a cab driver called the next day.

"Now what can you tell me about the boy? His parentage, how old he is and where he was born?"

Lord Barkis shrugged. "Only what his previous legal guardian, a Mr. Rzykruski, told me he's British yet speaks with an American accent. He's about 14, but how could anyone tell? Mr. Rsykruski also told me he was born in New England and he grew up in Leicester. And I most certainly have no idea about his parents."

Van Dort grunted, satisfied. He had never placed any reliance on the too-convenient story of electricity re-animating a corpse, and it was useful to know that Barkis had no evidence for it.

They had reached the street by now, and as soon as they stepped outside Van Dort began to drink in the fresh air. He tried frantically to clear his brain. Lord Barkis thrust out his hand for the coins Van Dort dropped into them.

"There's the shilling in advance for tomorrow. I'll send my coachman Mayhew at 10 am."

"He'll be ready."

"Here is my card."

Barkis pocketed the card, then seized Van Dort's hand in a greasy shake.

"Now we've got a deal. We understand each other-my friend. We understand each other completely."

He gave him the look of a conspirator that made Van Dort long to wrench himself away. Instead he bid a polite goodbye and turned down the street.

The afternoon had passed silently into dusk while he had been in the shop. Van Dort took his drink and settled in a dark corner where he was likely to be disturbed. He had the thing he was searching for, the thing that would make his own name, he would have pinched himself to make sure the afternoon's events had not been a dream with a lecture that would make his sensation.

The staff at the London Hospital was constantly alert for the new intake of patients that might prove to contain "the one"- the one that would have a rare disease but not a resurrected animal. Members of the board committee- Mayor Burgermeister and Victor's father-in-law Finis Everglot for one- had been known to remark that it was a scandal the way the wretched patients. Other doctors, equally scandalous in Burgermeister's oft-voiced opinion, did not wait for Mohammed to come off the mountain.

"How does my father-in-law expect medical science to progress if we're only able to investigate what has been investigated before?" he had demanded one evening with Alfred, whom he had taken to his own home for dinner. Alfred had made no answer, rightly divining that his role in this instance was to listen while Van Dort got it off his chest. But he had glanced at Victoria and received an understanding smile. Victoria too knew her role as a sounding board.

"Anatomy has always progressed in the teeth of orthodox opinion," Van Dort went on. "And if it hadn't continually flouted that opinion, we'd still be living in the days of Hippocrates. Leonardo da Vinci used to descend into crypts and the dead of night to dissect cadavers."

"Good Lord, Victor," said Alfred, revolted. "I believe you'd have brought bodies from Burke and Hare."

Sitting in the ale house now, Van Dort remembered his discussion with Alfred and silently repeated to himself that no doctor made progress if he were too delicate to soil his hands. It meant going to stinking holes like the one he had visited today. It meant dealing with crawling insects like Lord Barkis Bittern.

There was nothing to do but to put up with the situation, keep Lord Barkis at arm's length, and do his best to persuade the man to treat Victor Frankenstein and his dog with more humanity.

A small voice at the back of his mind whispered that it wasn't going to be that easy. But impatiently he forced the voice to be silent. There was no point in looking for trouble-especially now, when his ambitions were so nearly within his grasp. He would deal with the problems when they arose.

As he went out into the cool evening air, he was telling himself that they might never arise.

* * *

**You note that I used Tom Norman's real-life introductory speech for Joseph Merrick as well as Bytes' fictional equivalent one. I may have plans of combing the real events with the fictional ones in the film.**

**You may also note that most of the characters from the Land of the Dead from "Corpse Bride" are alive in this fanfic. You gotta add more at some point.**


	3. Chapter 3

Victor's mother, Nell Van Dort _was _the London Hospital (next to Matron Eva Luckes, that is). An inflexible woman in her early fifties with a hard, powerful face, she and Mrs. Luckes had been the Hospital's Head Matron for fifteen years, which was longer in a position of authority than could be claimed by anyone else – including her husband William, the head of the Hospital Administrative Committee. As such she commanded respect. William Van Dort himself addressed his own wife with careful courtesy. Young doctors avoided her. Established doctors said "Please."

Mrs. Van Dort was a shadow figure with a background of only one thing known for certain, and that was that she was one of the new breed of nurses that had emerged in the sixties under the influence of Miss Florence Nightingale. Prior to that nurses had been drunks, prostitutes, women of whom so little moral standing was expected that it was actually preferred for them to have had an illegitimate child, but that was all changed after Ms. Nightingale fell in love with a patient named John Smithurst among other men.

Nell was looking over the check books in the stone colored receiving room when Victor and his bundle wrapped dog came in with her coachman Meyhew. The male Van Dort then paid the coachman and he walked out with a small cough.

The senior Victor looked at the younger for a moment.

"Will you come with me, please?"

Hearing no response, Nell tapped the desk like a judge.

"You heard what my son said… go on."

They had reached Victor's office at last and the older man opened the door to let the younger boy in. As he closed the door he tried not to gag. In the small room the smell of Victor Frankenstein's dog was overwhelming. It was an effort to force himself to sit down, and when he had so he went to the window and opened it as far as it could go. When he turned back it seemed to him that the young boy drooped, as if in shame. He told himself not to be fanciful. He could not remember being so nervous before.

"My name is name is Victor Van Dort," he informed the bent head. "I am a surgeon here at the London Hospital, and I lecture in anatomy at the Medical College." "Mm-hmm." Victor responded out of any kind. He went on hurriedly. "I would very much like to examine you. Would that be all right?"

The younger Victor's voice had begun to sound ridiculous in his head, he looked at the floor for a moment and nodded his head.

"Yes. First I would like to ask you a few questions. Would that be all right?"

All the formal words the younger Victor could say were. "Un-huh." He had to go on past the senseless part.

"Good." He sat down at the desk and picked up a pencil. "Now let's see…your dog's name?"

Van Dort did not expect to receive a reply, but there was.

"Sparky." Came the boy's first words.

"Do you know where you were born?" he persisted. "Where do you come from?"

Victor lifted his head very slowly and stared blindly at his adult namesake. "New England. Leicester."

"I tell you what," said Van Dort desperately, "I'll ask you a question, and you shake your head like this for 'no,' and nod like this for 'yes.' All right? "Silence. "Do you understand?"

After a long interminable moment the ponderous boy replied. "I already know." Van Dort gave a sigh of relief, and his voice became businesslike.

"Has your dog always been-" He fought for a description that the boy could comprehend. "-the way he is now?" he said at last.

"No," came Victor's response, and the senior Victor wondered if he had taken too much for granted. A phrase like "the way you are now" had no meaning for him.

"Are you in any pain?" he asked.

The small Victor had a violent and startling reaction coming from his dog in a series of gulps and wheezes. Alarmed, Van Dort interrupted.

"Are your parents still alive?"

Immobile silence. The boy before him might have been a block of wood with a clinically depressed expression. It was exasperating when he had thought he was beginning to get through.

"Do you understand? Are they dead? Your father…" He waited a long time. "Your mother."

At once a desolate howl filled the room and the Frankenweenie began to rock back and forth as if in agony. Victor eyes began to weep. "…of shock…" he replied.

Van Dort stared at him, feeling desperately uncomfortable. But he was saved from having to offer some response when the dog flinched perceptibly.

Alfred's head appeared round the door.

"Victor, what are you doing for-" he wrinkled his nose in disgust. "I say, do open a window in here or…" For the first time he noticed Victor Frankenstein and his dog. "Oh, I'm dreadfully sorry. I had no idea that… I say!" His voice died away in embarrassment.

Van Dort crossed the room in two strides, seized Alfred by the arm, and bundled him forcibly into the corridor, closing the door behind them. Alfred blew out hard.

"Good Lord, Victor, what have you got in there?"

"You'll know presently. At the meeting of the society. But until then, I beg of you, Alfred, keep it to yourself."

"Of course," said Alfred as he walked away down the hall.

Van Dort turned the key to his office, the boy and dog were no longer there. They were hiding in the corner, crouch behind a black frock operating coat, so stiff with dried blood and pus they stood up by themselves.

Van Dort looked quickly around the room and finally saw them. He looked at the boy for a moment.

"Come sit down."

The boy just crouched there, looking at him. Van Dort pulled him up and over to the chair. Victor sat with the bundle and the older name sake paused with uncertainty.

"I think I'll examine you now. Would you remove the bundle, please?"

Victor leaned back fearfully as his older namesake lifted the bundle up.

* * *

_December 2__nd__, 1884_

The meeting of the Society was to take place in the lecture hall of the College of Anatomy, which was immediately next door to the London Hospital, and attached to it. That morning Edgar brought the Victor and his dog as usual, and found Van Dort. He made a last check with his assistants, who had brought Victor and the dog to sit behind a curtained stall from where he could be produced quickly.

The boy, carrying the exposed dog in his arms, sat silent and motionless as he always did.

In the hall, two camera operators triggered the flash powder to take photographs of the boy and dog, who startled at the flashing light.

Van Dort would soon have their attention. He began by a brief introduction of himself, and a carefully censored version of how he had happened to rim across the Frankenweenie.

"He is American-born, he is fourteen years of age, and his name is Victor Frankenstein and this dog 'Sparky'. Gentlemen, in the course of my profession I have come upon lamentable deformities of the face due to injury, as well as frailties of the body, depending upon like causes; but, at no time have I met with such a degraded or perverted version of a dog as this bull terrier. I wish to draw your attention to the insidious conditions affecting this patient. Note, if you will, the bolts on each side of his neck... and upper limb, which is totally fine. The alarming curvature of the tail ... Turn him, please."

He motioned to the doctors to turn the dog around. The students were now bent forward, concentrating, obviously consumed with interest.

"…and the extensive areas are covered by scars," Van Dort went on, "the patient has been called 'Frankenweenie'."

The applause was thunderous. At the last minute Van Dort had to restrain himself from yielding to an instinct to bow. That would have been a crass touch of theatricality. He wondered if the entire talk had been a mite too theatrical. He knew his lectures to students at the hospital were popular because of their witty racy style, so different from the dry assertions of fact favored by other lecturers.

* * *

Back in Van Dort's office, Victor and the dog were alone. Van Dort took out his notebook on the 'Frankenweenie' (he was now on his second) and began to enter into it points that had arisen out of the discussion. He had enough now, he decided, to start writing the paper that would consolidate this afternoon's work. He wrote on and on as things came back to him, hastening to get it all down while it was still fresh in his mind.

"Hmm?" Van Dort looked up, recalled to the present by a vaguely heard noise. He was alone except for the statue-like boy and his dog in the chair before him.

"It's been a long day for everyone," Van Dort agreed.

He closed his notebook and rose. "You'll need a cab. Stay here."

Victor moved on to the desk and his dog began touching things. He ran his nose slowly over the calipers. Then he paused as though something had struck him. He was staring at the blotter. Tucked into one corner was the calling card that Van Dort had given to Lord Barkis. He recognized the little square. He had seen it first in Barkis' hand then in Meyhew's as he studied it to check his destination. The 'Frankenweenie's' paw flickered out for a moment, then the card had disappeared into the folds of the blanket.

The sound of footsteps approaching down the corridor made him shiver. When Van Dort re-entered he was crouched back in the corner behind the glass case. This time the doctor knew where to look for him without hesitation.

"Come with me," he enjoined.

He took the boy and dog down to the front door and pointed out the cab waiting for him at the gate across the square. The duo had just begun their slow, painful movement over to the cab as Van Dort turned back to the hospital.

At a small landing on the first floor he looked out at the square. He could see Victor Frankenstein and his dog, who had almost reached the waiting cab. He became aware of Alfred standing behind him.

"Congratulations, Van Dort. You were very impressive."

"Since when were you a member of the Pathological Society?" Van Dort demanded with a grin.

"I slipped in at the back. I wasn't going to miss your moment of glory. Besides, I had to find out just what 'nothing of any importance' was. "

Dusk was falling. Lights gleamed from the windows of the hospital. Still Van Dort stood there, watching.

"You never mentioned his mental state," said Alfred.

"The dog is just like any other but his master is an imbecile, no doubt from birth. He speaks but-it's all a few words. No, the boy's a hopeless idiot." Van Dort spoke almost to himself. "I pray to God he's an idiot."

Footsteps sounded in the hall behind them. Hill had arrived with two older colleagues from the hospital, both of them members of the society.

"Quite a coupe, Victor," said one. "You'll look splendid in the journal."

"Wherever did you find that boy and his creature?" the other one was clapping Van Dort on the back and the three other men followed suit. Van Dort hardly noticed. His eyes were fixed on the boy and the dog, who had reached the cab and were about to climb in.


End file.
